Condamine Alliance receives the 2012 Australian Riverprize for work on Condamine River

Condamine Alliance receives the 2012 Australian Riverprize for work on Condamine River

25 Oct 2012

The Condamine Alliance with representatives from the International RiverFoundation and the Australian Government accept the 2012 Australian River

The Condamine Alliance is a natural resource management body designated by the Australian and Queensland Governments to look after the natural resources of the Condamine catchment. Its focus is the Condamine catchment, located at the headwaters of the Murray Darling basin and covering 2.75 million hectares.

The Alliance runs the river rescue program with community partners to improve river health which suffered following the summer floods of 2010-2011.

Volunteers organised through Conservation Volunteers Australia worked with the Alliance on the post flood clean-up, removing rubbish including pallets, bottles, shopping trolleys, car bodies and drums. At Warwick alone, over 60 tonnes of rubbish were removed.

Kevin Graham, Principal Project Officer from the Alliance said they had worked with average of seven or eight volunteers each week for six months

The volunteers shared a love of the environment which had brought them from all over the world including South Korea, the UK, America and Japan.

Their enthusiasm for the work they were doing kept them working in some very challenging conditions.

The International RiverFoundation awarded the 2012 Australian Riverprize to the Condamine Alliance on 10 October for demonstrating excellence in restoring native fish populations to the Condamine River.

The Alliance received $905,000 in 2012 to address urgent clean-up activities before the next wet season to mitigate soil erosion and rehabilitate riparian areas in the catchment.

This was part of a $2.63 million funding package for works in the Murray Darling catchments. A total of $8.4 million Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery funding was provided across Queensland for waterway and coastal projects following the summer disasters of 2010-2011 including the clean-up of debris and pest plants, river bank restoration and trickle tape clean up.